Related papers: Physically Impossible?
This paper presents a conceptual model describing the medium and long-term co-evolution of natural and socio-economic subsystems of Earth. An economy is viewed as an out-of-equilibrium dissipative structure that can only be maintained with…
A simple and effective approach to thermodynamics is suggested, which solves the major difficulties in the traditional presentation of the subject. The internal energy is introduced from the behavior of deformable bodies, whereas the…
The paper present one of attempts to apply the thermodynamics laws to economics. Introducing common thermodynamic parameters and considering world economics as a one macrosystem, authors demonstrate the possible consequences of entropy…
Natural resource use and waste production, disposal, and reuse in human economies are treated in their economic, technological and thermodynamic aspects. The physical nature of economic production, consumption, saving, and waste is compared…
Much of today's sustainability discourse emphasizes efficiency, clean technologies, and smart systems, but largely underestimates fundamental physical constraints relating to energy-matter interactions. These constraints stem from the fact…
The irreversibility of the dynamics of the conservative systems on example of hard disks and potentially of interacting elements is investigated in terms of laws of classical mechanics. The equation of the motion of interacting systems and…
The emergence of irreversibility in physical processes, despite the fundamentally reversible nature of quantum mechanics, remains an open question in physics. This thesis explores the intricate relationship between quantum mechanics and…
In this article we discuss a model used to introduce the concept of entropy with secondary school students. It can be used to discuss with students the reversibility of time, the tendency towards homogeneity and the link between probability…
The relationship between the intrinsic motion of gravity, light, and time is explored in terms of the principles of entropy, causality, energy, and symmetry conservation. A conceptual mechanism for gravity and the gravitational connection…
The application of principles of thermodynamics and statistical mechanics to economic systems is considered in a broad historical perspective, extending from prehistoric times to the present day. The hypothesis of maximum entropy production…
Econophysics, is based on the premise that some ideas and methods from physics can be applied to economic situations. We intend to show in this paper how a physics concept such as entropy can be applied to an economic problem. In so doing,…
Statistical thermodynamics is valuable as a conceptual structure that shapes our thinking about equilibrium thermodynamic states. A cloud of unresolved questions surrounding the foundations of the theory could lead an impartial observer to…
We first present open questions related to the foundations of thermodynamics and statistical physics. We then argue that in principle one can not have "closed systems", and that a universal background should exist. We propose that the…
The physical foundations of a variety of emerging technologies --- ranging from the applications of quantum entanglement in quantum information to the applications of nonequilibrium bulk and interface phenomena in microfluidics, biology,…
Assessing quantitatively the state and dynamics of a social system is a very difficult problem. It is of great importance for both practical and theoretical reasons such as establishing the efficiency of social action programs, detecting…
This is an invited article for the Discussion and Debate special issue of The European Physical Journal Special Topics on the subject "Can Economics Be a Physical Science?" The first part of the paper traces the personal path of the author…
The reversibility and recurrence paradoxes are key issues that have been left unsolved in researches on the foundation of thermodynamics since the 19th century. This article shows that (1) the reversibility paradox can be overcome if we pay…
We attempt to describe geometry in terms of informational quantities for the universe considered as a finite ensemble of correlated quantum particles. As the main dynamical principle, we use the conservation of the sum of all kinds of…
A vast concourse of events and phenomena occur in nature that may be interrelated by a entropy-maximization technique that provides a comprehensible explanation of a range of physical problems, integrating in a new framework the universal…
We present the relatively less known thermodynamic concept of exergy in the context of ecology and sustainability. To this end, we first very briefly outline thermodynamics as it arose historically via engineering studies. This enables us…